


And If You Ever Hurt Me...I'll Let You Know

by DixonGrimes



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Character Death, Daryl's PoV, M/M, Not A Happy Ending, POV changes drastically, Rape/Non-con Elements, Rick's POV, Rickyl, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-20
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2019-03-21 16:41:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13745055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DixonGrimes/pseuds/DixonGrimes
Summary: A dying relationship gives its last heartbeats.





	And If You Ever Hurt Me...I'll Let You Know

“You’re drunk.” 

Daryl scoffed and chucked the last of the bottle back. “Now I am.”

“Don’t light that in here,” Rick chided when he reaches for a cigarette. “Judith’s upstairs.”

He grumbles something Rick can’t hear; gets up from the couch and goes out into the porch. He smokes his cigarette there, while peeking over his shoulder at Rick as he grimly collects the empty bottles and cans he left littered around the living room. He scoffs again. Rick could be a real pain in the ass when he wanted to, and no doubt he did that to spite him, always complaining about how ‘shoes don’t go on the coffee table. Take them off at least, Judy draws there!’ Or about how ‘that cigarette stink is not appealing in the slightest’, how ‘picking up Carl at school on his bike is NOT safe, even though the kid loves it;’ about how ‘cursing in the house is not allowed, so why do you keep doing it?’ There’s always something wrong. Always something to bitch about.

Daryl has called Rick that a couple of times in anger, bitch, which has only made matters worse. Bur Rick knew what he was getting into when they began this mess of a love story, and seemed very determined on making Daryl a part of his family. But that has changed. What hasn’t changed is himself. He’s still the same man that bought Rick that drink at the bar six months ago. But Rick has. He’s become somber and quiet. He’s irritable and impenetrable, so much that their sex life has dropped to a flat zero. Rick used to be insatiable. Now, he barely acknowledges him while they’re in the bedroom, a tactic that effectively kills the mood.

Daryl has come to the conclusion, that it must be someone else. Why on earth else would Rick change his mind about him so drastically? He used to adore him, bad habits and all.

Yeah. It had to be someone else. 

Back in the house, Rick is waiting with his hands on his hips. 

“I threw away those empty cans and bottles you left here.” Rick sneers. He’s pissed. “Maybe next time, you could pick them up yourself.”

“Was gonna,” he shrugs.

“Bullshit.”

Daryl scratches at his hair. It’s stringy, unwashed. Rick used to ask him to take a shower almost every day. Now, he doesn’t even bother to ask. Pointless anyway, since they don’t even touch no more. 

“Naw whatcha say ‘bout using that kind of language in the house?” he prods. Rick bristles. 

“Oh, give me a break.”

“Wasn’t done anyway,” he says and makes his way to the liquor cabinet.

“You’ve had enough.”

“Then why can I still hear your yapping? Wanna get shitfaced drunk till I hear none of yer shit.”

“My shit?” Rick chuckles. “Oh, that’s rich.”

“Maybe you should get shitfaced drunk, too. Ya could use some loosen up. Too fucking tight and not in the good way.”

Rick’s about to bark something back, but contains himself and sighs. Takes a deep breath before carrying on in a hushed tone. “I don’t want you drunk where Judith could walk right in and see you passed out on the couch, stinking of stale alcohol.”

“I’ll go to the bar,” he says and fishes out less than half a bottle of cheap scotch. 

“So you can come back at four in the morning and drunkenly stomp your way in, tripping on everything and waking everybody up?”

“Won’t come back,” he grumbles back around a mouthful of strong liquid.

“Maybe that’d be the best,” Rick muttered, looking away.

“What? What was that? Can’t hear ya!” he says, raising his voice. 

Rick makes a shushing gesture and stares at him with reproach, takes a deep breath and lets out. “I said…maybe it’d be best if you don’t come back.”

It should’ve hurt, but he’s numbed down by the alcohol. 

“Until you fuckin’ said it. Was thinkin’ you never would,” he grunts and takes another gulp. 

“What’re you waiting for?”

Daryl stares at Rick through hazy eyes. Doesn’t answer, drops the empty bottle on the carpet and turns back to pull another one from the cabinet. He doesn’t get to, for Rick pulls him back by the shoulder.

“No! That’s enough, Daryl!”

He’s drunk, so his common sense and inhibitions are numbed down, but not his strength, and he doesn’t hold back when he punches Rick in the jaw, nor he stops right there and apologize for knocking him on his ass, like he would’ve had he been sober. He punches Rick’s sides and he’s about to punch his face again, but Rick is able to dodge it and push the heavy, angry redneck off him with his knee. But he’s not quick enough to get away and soon, Daryl has him in a head lock, cutting off his air supply. 

Rick tries in vain to escape by punching at Daryl’s arms, but the man is strong, stronger than him. And relentless. He’s not letting go.

“Daryl, stop!” he chokes out, pawing at Daryl’s thick forearm weakly. He’s terrified. He’s never seen Daryl consumed by such anger, at least not directed at him. 

They’ve made quite a racket so there’s a high chance that Judith has heard them and the idea of her walking in on Daryl chocking him is less than tempting. At least Carl isn’t home.

His lungs burn as he struggles to get enough air into them. There’re tears prickling at the corners of his eyes and the corners of his vision are getting fuzzy and somewhat darkened. And Daryl’s still not letting go.

He realizes he’s blacked out for a few seconds when he’s on his back on the floor and with no recollection of how he got there. There’s some shuffling coming from around his feet. A cold breeze makes him realize he’s naked form the waist down. And he panics. Daryl is hovering over him now, red-faced and drunken, lust-filled stare back at him. 

“Daryl?” 

“Shhh,” Daryl shushes him and positions himself between his thighs. Rick swallows and starts shaking his head. 

“Shit, Rick—I missed fucking ya,” Daryl slurs and pulls Rick’s hips down to his crotch.  
It hurts. It’s been a few weeks since they had sex and he’s tight. Not that that matters to Daryl’s inebriated mind when he forces his way in, no preparation. 

“So fucking tight…so tight.”

As those words are huffed against his ear, Rick is paralyzed. He doesn’t even make a sound when Daryl starts moving, tearing at his insides. At least during the beginning. When he gets a sense of what’s happening to him, he starts to move, and tries to pry his wrists from the iron grip Daryl’s got on them. They don’t budge though, and trying to buck his hips up to make Daryl topple off him only manages to cause him pain as Daryl’s thick member continues to spear him. So he can only cry out.

“Stop!” 

It’s a wretched scream, which no doubt will wake Judy up if she hasn’t woken up already, but he has to make this stop. 

It takes a couple of minutes. But Daryl hears him and looks up from where he’d been nipping at Rick’s neck. 

“Get off of me,” Rick hisses.

It takes a moment for realization to hit the hunter, during which he searches Rick’s eyes with intoxicated confusion. Daryl doesn’t know what he’s doing to him and Rick doesn’t dare to say it out loud.

And then it hits, and his eyes widen. He pulls away as if burned. 

Rick winces.

“Fuck…fuck, Rick…lemme—” Daryl reaches for him as he worms out of the redneck’s proximity.

“Don’t. Touch me,” he hisses and starts pulling his pants back up. Just when he’s zipping up his fly, a tiny voice drags both their attention.

“Daddy?”

Daryl doesn’t move or makes any effort to acknowledge their daughter. Rick stares at him then turns to Judith. “Judy, we were just—playing,” he lies. “Tickling fight. It got out of hand. Sorry we woke you, honey.”

“That’s okay,” Judith smiles, and clutches her stuffed bear to her chest. “Who won?”

“No one,” Rick grunts, looking down now.

“Daryl? Will you read me a story? You never do anymore.”

“I’ll read it to you. Daryl has to go out.”

“Go to bed and I’ll…I’ll be right there.” Rick is holding himself together surprisingly well. His hands are shaking, though, so he rests them on his hips.

“Okay. Bye Daryl,” Judith waves and then climbs back up the stairs.

Daryl doesn’t look at him. He’s looking at the floor. Sweaty bangs covering his face. He looks like a wounded animal. In any other case, he’d go right to him to comfort him and tell him everything’s going to be okay. That they can work through this. But he can’t. And he won’t. 

“Go.”

“Rick—“

“I don’t want to talk about this. Just go.”

“You know I’d never hurt you.”

“You just did.”

There’s a heavy moment of silence when Daryl just stares at the floor, clenching and unclenching his trembling fists. Rick just waits. 

“Sorry,” Daryl chokes out and leaves the house in a flash, leaving Rick standing there alone. 

When the familiar engine of Daryl’s bike gets further away, Rick gets to pick up the mess they made. He moves slowly, but he tidies everything up so Carl doesn’t have to do it while wondering what happened there.

When he’s done, Rick goes upstairs. It’s painful, climbing those steps, but he manages. Once upstairs, he peeks inside Judith’s bedroom and smiles at her. “I’ll be right there.”

And he walks the rest of the distance to the bathroom and closes the door behind him. He pulls down his pants, noticing his belt has been undone the whole time and bends over to inspect the damage, using a paper towel to see if there’s any blood. There isn’t. Daryl wasn’t overly rough. He never was. But it still hurts. 

Rick looks at his face in the mirror. There’s a bruise forming on his jaw and the inner skin of his lip is broken. He can taste the blood. 

Adjusting his position causes a sharp jolt of pain to shoot up his back. Looking down, he grabs the edges of the sink. A sob escapes his lips. 

Rick had told Daryl, more than once, that he was a decent man going out of his way to act the opposite. Why he did that, Rick could only assume. Daryl had grown up in a broken home. He’d been let down and left behind by his own family. Rick came to the conclusion that Daryl’s way of testing Rick’s loyalty was by pushing him and daring him into abandoning him. 

Tonight, he’d made it impossible not to. 

He’d grown weary of telling Daryl to be more considerate, of telling him that his hot-headed actions had consequences and that he was hurting people around him. But this was not Daryl entering the house with muddy shoes or Rick having to be the one to arrest him after he’d been in a bar fight. This was something he could not let pass. This was beyond anything he’d ever thought Daryl capable of.

After cleaning up, Rick goes back to Judith’s room and reads her a bedtime story. The whole while, there’s a heavy feeling in his gut. His voice cracks midsentence and he can’t breathe for the second time that night. And it’s in that very moment when Daryl intentionally swerves left, right into an oncoming truck.


End file.
